Moscow has said that the US and its allies are still bet on a continuing conflict.
The US and its allies are still interested in the continuing conflict in Ukraine, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Sunday. The government in Kiev hasn't thought about any potential peace talks because western nations prevent it from thinking about any potential peace talks, the official said.
When asked about the possible reasons that have led German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and French President Emmanuel Macron to no longer call Russian President Vladimir Putin, Peskov said that western leaders are not interested in peace through dialogue and negotiations.
Peskov told the Moscow TV show that the western nations are actively betting on the continued war. The position of Western nations led by Washington leads to a situation where Ukrainians can neither think nor talk about peace, the Russian president spokesman said.
The Kremlin believes that common sense would prevail and the sides will return to the negotiation table. Peskov commented that the time for talks will come soon, as the demand for pacifying the situation is low. Kiev will have to understand all the demands put forward by Moscow before the talks can continue, the Kremlin spokesman pointed out. He said that Kiev just needs to sit down at the table and sign a document that has already been largely agreed, and that the Ukrainian government is aware of Russia's position. Moscow and Kiev started peace talks just four days after the start of the Russian military operation in Ukraine in late February. The sides held several rounds in person in Belarus and then continued the talks via a video link. In late March, the delegations from Russia and Ukraine met again in Istanbul.
Since then, the talks have stalled, as the Ukrainian side has insisted that it would only come back to the table when it was in a stronger negotiating position. In April, Putin accused Kiev of bringing the process to a deadlock. Peskov said at the time that Russia had provided Ukraine with a draft agreement and was waiting for a response.
In June Ukraine's top negotiator David Arakhamia suggested that Kiev believes it could achieve this favorable position by late August after it conducts counteroffensive operations in certain areas. Russia sent troops into Ukraine on February 24 citing Kiev's failure to implement the Minsk agreements, designed to give the regions of Donetsk and Lugansk special status within the Ukrainian state. The protocols, brokered by France and Germany, were first signed in 2014. Former Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko has admitted that Kiev's main goal was to use the ceasefire to buy time and create powerful armed forces. In February 2022, the Kremlin recognized the Donbass republics as independent states and demanded that Ukraine declare itself a neutral country that will never join any Western military bloc. Kiev insists that the Russian offensive was unprovoked.